Victory for FWS at the Supreme Court
Scottish Lesbians welcomes the verdict of the Supreme Court in favour of biological sex.
Lesbian campaign group Scottish Lesbians welcomes today’s outcome from the Supreme Court, which has ruled in favour of a biological understanding of sex. This ruling restores freedom of association to lesbians and allows us to exclude biological men from our groups, spaces and associations.
Lesbians have been at the forefront of the harm caused by the confusion around the Equality and Gender Recognition Acts. We have seen our culture destroyed, lesbian spaces have disappeared, and young lesbians are disproportionately represented in gender clinics. This case has been an existential one for lesbians and we're glad to finally have clarity over the law.
Scottish Lesbians is particularly pleased to have contributed to this outcome through our Lesbian Intervention, submitted in partnership with the Lesbian Project and LGB Alliance, which made the case for a biological interpretation of sex clearly and compellingly and had a material impact on the decision.
The Supreme Court ruling means that organisations, government bodies, companies, and associations need to look carefully at their policies to ensure that single sex spaces are indeed single sex. The law is now clear and we call on those bodies to begin this process immediately and restore ‘lesbian’ to its accurate meaning of same-sex attracted woman.
We would like to thank For Women Scotland, for their tenacity in bringing this case to the Supreme Court, and our legal team of Peter Daly, Karon Monaghan KC and Beth Grosman for their brilliant work on our intervention.
You can read the full ruling from the Supreme Court here: https://supremecourt.uk/cases/uksc-2024-0042
Letter to Nicola Sturgeon
We were pleased to co-sign the letter organised by Murray Blackburn Mackenzie to Nicola Sturgeon. The letter challenges Ms Sturgeon to clarify her comments on 'forces that muscled into' Scottish politics, and particularly the GRR Act debate. We hope she replies and states clearly to whom she is referring.
You can read the full text of the letter on the Murray Blackburn Mackenzie website here: https://murrayblackburnmackenzie.org/2024/12/23/multi-signatory-letter-to-nicola-sturgeon/
Supreme Court Intervention submission
The submission from Scottish Lesbians, The Lesbian Project and LGB Alliance has now been lodged with the Supreme Court, in advance of the hearing at the end of November. You can read it here: https://scottishlesbians.org.uk/resources
Intervention at the Supreme Court
Scottish Lesbians, along with The Lesbian Project and LGB Alliance, has been granted permission to submit a written intervention in the case brought by For Women Scotland against the Scottish Government. The case seeks to clarify in law that sex means biological sex. You can read more about the case on For Women Scotland's CrowdJustice page here: https://www.crowdjustice.com/case/uksc-definition-of-sex-in-equality-act/
Letters to the Scottish Government
We have written to the First Minister, John Swinney, and Equalities Minister, Kaukab Stewart, expressing our concerns about the way a group of Scottish Lesbians were treated at Edinburgh Pride on Saturday 22nd June. We have asked for their comments on the events, and made a (second) request for a meeting with Kaukab Stewart to discuss our concerns.
You can see both letters here: https://scottishlesbians.org.uk/resources
NEW Links added
New link page added with all the fabulous lesbian groups we work with! https://scottishlesbians.org.uk/links
